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Kay Jebelli

@kayjebelli.bsky.social
322 followers 295 following 1.9K posts

Computer engineer/competition lawyer; TCK; personal views expressed. Pro-abundance policy, working @progresschamber.org

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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
See the full piece here: bsky.app/profile/pro...
bsky.app
Chamber of Progress (@progresschamber.org)
Age gates sound simple. Actually enforcing them without collecting IDs, misidentifying teenagers, or creating new privacy risks is anything but. https://progresschamber.org/insights/eu-kids-act-age-verification-no-free-lunch/
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
My asks: • Make zero-knowledge proofs and unlinkability binding • Bar Member States from demanding legal ID • Phase in obligations only once the Scheme is available, tested and accessible • Keep mandatory checks to actually high-risk services
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Yet platforms would have to comply within a year. That's an incredibly short timeframe to get this right.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Then there's readiness. Use of online public services ranges from 76% of young Finns to 4% of older Romanians. Many countries haven't named proof-of-age issuers. Researchers bypassed the Commission's demo app in July.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
@eff.org goes further: age gates erode civil liberties and create barriers to getting online however they're designed, often hitting marginalised groups hardest. And the Act's "risky services" definition sweeps in nearly every mainstream platform. www.eff.org/deeplinks/2...
eff.org
EU Kids Act Won't Keep the Internet Accountable and Trustworthy
The EU Commission draft law to restrict young people’s access to the internet that it presented last week will come at a high cost: it will put online services behind age gates, expand the use of
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
But digital rights are still at stake. As @edri.org points out, 27 national apps means 27 audits and uneven privacy protections. Some Member States are also weighing demands for legal identity, not just proof of age. The Act should rule that out. edri.org/our-work/eu...
edri.org
Why the EU age-verification tool does not solve privacy concerns - European Digital Rights (EDRi)
An EU legislative proposal for a social media ban will be presented at the State of the European Union annual address, but the tools which are pitcd as “ready” and “privacy-preserving” fail on both counts.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
On paper, the safeguards are strong: zero-knowledge proofs, no tracking or profiling, data minimisation, at least one free and accessible option in every Member State, and no re-verification for adults already checked with high confidence.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The KIDS Act's answer is the EU Age Verification Scheme: a proof-of-age attestation from a certified issuer, held in an app or the EU Digital Identity Wallet. Modelled on Estonia's X-Road: verified data exchange, no single point of control. The least-bad option on the table.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Governments have been too quick to treat age checks and age gating features as a solved problem. Worth reading about what happened in the UK recently when ministers got a bit overconfident: www.ft.com/content/670...
ft.com
Ministers embraced the ‘world’s safest phone’. Then it unravelled
A security researcher discovered flaws in the first phone to integrate real-time nudity-blocking software
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The alternative, ID checks, bring their own risks. A breach at a vendor Discord used for ID checks exposed 70,000 users' documents. 153 million driver's licences have turned up on the dark web. www.theverge.com/news/797051... And ID gates shut out people without documents or the tech to use them.
theverge.com
Discord says 70,000 users may have had their government IDs leaked in breach
The ID pics had been submitted as part of age-related appeals.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
Today's tools fall short. Facial age estimation uses sensitive biometric data, varies across demographic groups, and in Australia kids fooled it with props and relatives' faces. The Commission admits age estimate is less accurate for 13–17s, right where the KIDS Act draws its lines.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The Commission's proposal sets a staircase of age gates: • Under 13: no social media • 13–14: "mini" accounts set up by guardians • 15–17: own accounts, safe by design The Commission's explainer: digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/faqs/kid...
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 23/09/2026
The EU KIDS Act would age-gate "Social Media+": social networks, video platforms, games, AI chatbots and app stores. Every rule in it hinges on one thing: knowing how old users are. That's the part that bites.👇
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Here's CAF's full letter btw: appfairness.org/open-letter...
appfairness.org
Open Letter: Apple’s New EU App Store Terms Still Fail the DMA - Coalition for App Fairness
BRUSSELS: The Coalition for App Fairness, alongside 17 other organisations representing app developers, associations, digital businesses, news media publishers, consumer organisations and civil society groups, has published a joint letter raising serious concerns over Apple's new business terms for
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
It's hard to come to a reasonable conclusion to all this when one side can continue to play spoiler and receives no reprimand or pushback for this. But I'm afraid that might be where we are. Hopefully I'm wrong.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
The problem with that is the evidence of the opportunities being genuine is largely going to be subjective. CAF will boycott the changes, they won't take advantage of them, and then they'll say it's because they're not genuine. They have zero interest in actually making it work
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Are we there yet? I'm not sure. I think they still have the EC's ear. I was at a conference yesterday where an EC official said that the line is to create opportunity for rivals, but not to re-engineer market shares. So stop once genuine opportunities are created.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
None of these companies have anything but their own interests at heart. That's fine of course, you expect them to advocate for their own interests and make their best case to the European Commission. But at a certain point their special pleadings have to be ignored.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I don't even want to get into the ways that Match group exploits its lovelorn customers, gamifies the dating world, and has generally lead to a breakdown of social relations. www.vanityfair.com/culture/201...
vanityfair.com
Tinder and the Dawn of the Dating Apocalypse
As romance gets swiped from the screen, some twentysomethings aren’t liking what they see.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Spotify, as another example, distributes roughly 70% of its music revenue to industry rights holders, retaining the remaining 30% to cover its platform operations and investments. Again, much higher than Apple's 5% fee.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Note, Epic recently dropped the fee it charges creators in its ecosystem, from a whopping 74%, down to 37%. Apple's 5% fee is peanuts in comparison.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Smaller app developers tend to like using Apple's ecosystem, the trust it provides for end-users, and realise the benefits that ultimately accrue to them. They don't want to see fragmentation of the ecosystem, which will mean higher development costs. actonline.org/post/small-...
actonline.org
UPDATED: Small app developers appreciate the CMA’s pause on consideration of concerning alternate app distribution, other issues remain
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
Well, not all sellers of digital goods, because only a handful of the biggest name brands will be able to encourage users to download via alternate distribution. The Tinders, Spotifys, Epics of the world. Exactly the members of CAF.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
So what is at stake if they succeed? Less phone innovation, higher phone prices, or higher developer fees (or some combination of the above). Generally a worse situation for all normal users. But it's a massive transfer of value over to the sellers of digital goods.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
CAF and their supporters, those who do sell digital goods, want to benefit from all the new Apple technology. Apple of course keeps investing in new technology and needs to get compensation for it. Have you seen the latest launches? www.engadget.com/2253955/eve...
engadget.com
Everything Apple announced at the foldable iPhone Duo launch - Engadget
Here's all the new info Apple dropped today from its keynote.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
That's a business model that Apple has chosen, it incentivises non-digital goods, and Apps that are tied to real-world services, or monetise in other ways. It taxes things like in-game items, vbucks, boosts to your tinder profile, or streaming subscriptions where you own nothing
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
The reason Apple can charge so little for developers is because it charges a handful of digital service providers a commission on digital transactions. Note, the vast majority of apps pay no commission, because they are ad supported, or don't sell digital goods.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
The letter takes aim at the new "Core Technology Commission", which is Apple's way of getting compensated (5%) for all the technology it keeps building into iPhones, and which developers have virtually free access to otherwise ($99/year for the Apple Developer Program)
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I said at the time that these anti-Apple groups wouldn't take the settlement lying down, and that they'd agitate for greater enforcement. Well, here is the first public sign of that agitation. bsky.app/profile/kay...
bsky.app
Kay Jebelli (@kayjebelli.bsky.social)
As I've said many times, they'll never be happy. So Kudos to the Commission if they actually draw the line here. But I'm still skeptical that they will.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
I did a thread on the new business terms a few weeks ago, noting that the situation was unresolved, that despite the measures taken by Apple and the deep engagement with the Commission, the EC hadn't committed to closing the case. bsky.app/profile/kay...
bsky.app
Kay Jebelli (@kayjebelli.bsky.social)
Big news for European app developers, Apple is making further changes to its business terms to meet EC requirements under the DMA. It's restructured and simplified its terms, reduced rates, scraped the Core Technology Fee and replaced it with a Core Technology Commission.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 10/09/2026
The Coalition for App Fairness has published a letter pressuring the European Commission to re-open its DMA enforcement against Apple, they've got a few additional signatories as well. But it's the same old story. They're not happy with what they've already won and they want more
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
In these circumstances, it's no wonder the US administration is critical.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
What's worse is that, despite these changes, Google has signalled that the EC still hasn't given them any regulatory certainty. The EC is still going to hold the threat of daily fines over Google's head, without clarifying what else it's asking for.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
How can Europeans be celebrating a degradation of the user experience? How has this become the standard for acceptable competition policy? If we continue to hold this up as good digital policy, there's no way we're going to be able to compete in the 21st century.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Intermediaries that have used the apparatus of government to insert themselves between users and the information they're looking for, are of course, celebrating
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Google calls this "the largest reduction in search quality in its history", the EC calls it "substantial progress toward compliance". That tells you everything you need to know. pro.politico.eu/news/223985
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
I predicted this would happen based on the description of "regulatory dialogue" that the EC revealed in their decision last week. x.com/KayJebelli/...
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Instead of enforcing the law proportionately, the EC has confirmed that they want Google to degrade their services, to make room for "contestability". www.reuters.com/world/googl...
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
It's something they couldn't do under competition law, but they can under the DMA because the DMA doesn't care about effects or any justifications for the conduct. It has strict prohibitions that, frankly, mean a lot of pro-competitive conduct has become illegal in Europe.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 08/09/2026
Well, it's happening. European regulators have decided that they want to use the Digital Markets Act (DMA) to make Google Search worse for all European users, so they can prop up European rivals and protect them from competition from Google.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Uber is, thankfully, appealing. Hopefully the Courts can make some sense of this mess.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Penalties should be pegged to harm, and they should be proportionate. Until then, the cost of building a digital business in Europe goes up, as European DPA's pursue big fines over mitigating harm.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
And this doesn't just affect Uber. It's every digital business in Europe that now has to operate in the shadow of having a year of operating profit wiped out.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
What sits on the other side of that €825 million is a company deciding who it keeps doing business with — inside a commercial opportunity it built, in a market that didn't exist before, scaling to meet growing consumer demand (who are moving away from the failed legacy taxi model).
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Harm is never measured. Nor is purpose. Article 22 offers three narrow gateways and no balancing test, so "we were catching people overcharging passengers" isn't even a defence, at all.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
That's not a slap on the wrist, it's a smack to the face and puts the entire operating logic of the business at risk.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
Back of the envelope, that fine represents roughly 80-85% of a year's estimated operating profit from Uber's entire EMEA Mobility business (includes delivery and freight). And that's probably much more than the profits for ride hailing in the EU.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
How many were affected in total? Nobody counted. Nobody had to: GDPR fines come off global turnover (not profit). In fact, During the years it punishes, 2018 to 2022, Uber lost $22 billion from operations — not one profitable year among them. But Uber is being penalised now that it is.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
The DPA doesn't dispute that Uber had cause to ban them from the platform. Still, Uber stopped the practice years ago.
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Kay Jebelli @kayjebelli.bsky.social · 27/08/2026
The GDPR requires human intervention. Uber says they were in the loop, and in the meantime, the drivers temporarily suspended could have continued defrauding European passengers. In the end, according to Uber only 126 drivers across Europe actually lost their accounts to low ratings in 2021.
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